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Sunday, May 16, 2010

Chaaya Blu, a John Keells Hotel that opened in Trincomalee earlier this month, has pioneered star class tourism on Sri Lanka s awakening East Coast with an 80-room luxury resort entailing a Rs. 450 million investment.

The previous Club Oceanic s 56 rooms have been expanded into 80 and given a new look and theme with an extensive refurbishment, with the property offering guests four-star comfort and breathtaking views on a prime location with whale and dolphin watching added to other seaside holiday attractions.

`We re sold out for the Vesak weekend, a company spokesperson said. ``The May deadline for re-opening the hotel has been met.

Asked whether the hotel is also being patronized by foreign tourists, the spokesperson said `Our sales people tell us that about 40% of the guests are tourists. It will quietly build up.

Chaaya Blu Trincomalee joins a group five other four-star resorts in Sri Lanka and the Maldives, the owners said.

This hotel is the first sizeable investment seen on the East Coast following the dawn of peace and will meet the demand for quality accommodation with the increasing inflow of tourists into that area.

The John Keells Group owns 40 acres of beachfront land at Nilaveli with development of this property part of its future plans. While the construction of new hotels in the East is very much in the pipeline, actual building has not yet started.

`We take pride in launching a resort of the calibre of Chaaya Blu, a first of its kind on the East Coast, within a mere year of gaining peace in Sri Lanka. It was a much rewarding challenge, given that we can now offer our guests the opportunity to discover and savour all that is truly unique to the East Coast while staying amidst star class comforts,` Jayantissa Kehelpannala, Executive Vice-President of Keells Hotels said.

The project, one of the first investment decisions taken by John Keells upon the dawn of peace in May last year, and acted upon almost soon after, as the industry itself had previously been restrained in investing in East Coast tourism.

`With Chaaya Blu Trincomalee we continue to be tourism trendsetters,` says Deputy Chairman of John Keells Holdings Ajit Gunewardene. `It is not merely with pride but also with a sense of responsibility that we believe the success of this launch will create confidence towards attracting more tourism development on the East Coast.`

With over three decades experience in the tourism industry, JKH, an undisputed industry leader in the hospitality industry, has added fillip to a part of the country which has for long not had much development given the constraints it faced.

`And with the dawn of peace and the realization that there was a dearth of a resort conforming to international standards in Trincomalee, we made a decision to quickly cement our presence on the east coast,` Gunawardene said.

He pointed that a 1970s property has been completely modernized with unique contemporary architecture, features and facilities, adding a new dynamic to Sri Lankan resorts as a whole.

`We ve got a stylish retro-chic product at Chaaya Blu that will set trends in modern resort interiors being outside the typical Sri Lankan resort design,` he said.

The owners brought in the skills of master architect Channa Daswatte to imbue the unique blues of the Trincomalee sea and the whites of the sand into the double arched design of the property.

The hotel has 80 rooms including 20 chalets and two suites complementing the Trincomalee landscape. The combination of a series of bleached wooden decks encircles the periphery of the property and a timber boardwalk protrudes across the reception area onto the beach and into the sea.

The beach chalets sell for Rs. 20,000 nett with full board per night and the superior rooms on full board double at Rs. 16,000.

Mosaic walls with strategically placed disco balls in the foyer and denim upholstered mid-century Scandinavian limed furniture accessorized by white dipped terra cotta tiles and clay lamps gives a touch of the Caribbean to the property.

``However much of the promise of the resort seems to involve showcasing the wondrous offerings of Trincomalee itself which have remained long inaccessible for most, Sri Lankans included, the owners noted.

``Another raison d etre that makes Chaaya Blu special is the abundant sightings of blue whales which now complete a triad of whale sighting locations in Sri Lanka, collectively spanning eight months of the year.

Kehelpannala explains `This seaside retreat, with its superior rooms, beach chalets, restaurants and bars is an open invite to enjoy the Blu to its fullest. The hotel has a dedicated excursion centre as well as a PADI certified diving centre to enable our guests to make the most of some of the best dive spots in Asia, go snorkeling around Pigeon Island, join a whale and dolphin watching expedition or embark on exciting and insightful tours in to the yet unexplored locality.`

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

If a cook merely boiled some white or red rice and offered it you, you would eat it if you were very, very hungry, right? But it would be basically flat and tasteless. On the other hand, if the cook added some turmeric to it, some peppercorns, cardamoms, cloves, a stick of cinnamon, some pieces of rampe [Pandanus latifolia], a few leaves of karapincha [Murraya Koenigii], and some salt; then tempered it with some sliced big onions in sizzling coconut oil and added it to the rice (your salivary glands are already working overtime), the aromas from that dish of rice and the taste would be out-of-this-world, right? You’d also eat it with gusto. If I were to stray into the realm of our curries this would become more of a culinary article. Our culture or the composite Sri Lankan culture is something like this analogy about the spiced rice.

There’s no gainsaying the fact that in the urban centres the inhabitants enjoy the astonishing variety of our cuisine represented by the Sonahar [Moor] godhamba-rotti with mutton curry made of lots of coriander and coconut milk; or the Tamil masala thosai with shambar and ulundhu-vaddai; or lampries baked in a banana-leaf; or rice with pol-sambola and kiri-hodhi (aanang). Each, in its inimitable way, is a treat to be savoured. On the other hand, if it was merely rice with pol-sambola and kiri-hodhi, everyday and everywhere, that would be very, very boring. This is just one aspect of our mutually-shared and enjoyed culture. Our attractiveness lies, hopefully, in our profoundly enduring diversity

When it comes to sweetmeats we have the unique bibikkan [or bolo de coco] or coconut cake made from coconut jaggery, rice flour, and a bouquet of spices; then the Flemish dough cake or Breudher [Broeder] beloved of the Burghers; Kalu dhodhol with embedded cashew nuts vies for place with bright crimson or amber yellow maskat; and then, from Jaffna, Kolukaddai and Seeni Ariyatharam. The sheer variety of home-made food and beverage is exhausting. Who hasn’t enjoyed Chicken Buriyani or Ghee Rice; Malay beef curry or Nasi Goreng?

There are an entire gamut of religious and secular cultural festivals and festive occasions celebrated in and outside homes with friends and family such as ‘Magula’ or the wedding, the Devana Gamana—Maha Magula three day’s later, Aluth Avuruddha or New Year, Vadiviya Pamineema or Coming-of-age, Kath Bandi Magula, Aluth Sahal Mangalaya, Kiri Ammalage Dana, Maha Shivarathri, Navarathri, Thai Pongal, Id-ul-Fitr or Ramazan, Id-ul-Azha or Hajj, Ka-Muruthal, Nikkah, and so on. Each is different in the various regions of the country. The Sonahar and the Malays, though both following Islam, have different ceremonies and ways in which these are celebrated or commemorated. The Christian community largely celebrates Christmas and Easter and the Catholics of Negombo have their Passion play on Duwa Island.

All segments of the population have different types of music and dance: The Sinhalese have three classical dance forms—the Kandyan, Sabaragamuva and the Ruhunu; the Tamils have the classical Bharata Natyam, the Burghers their Kaffiringha Baila with its toe-tapping rhythms and humourous lyrics. The miniscule Kaffir community has its Manga (pron. ‘manja’) with tambourines, coconut shells, bottles and spoons.

All of this is enjoyed by everyone unless there are some few brooding Cassandra-like bigots decrying the polyglot nature of Sri Lankan culture.

What all this and more demonstrates is that we Sri Lankans have more things in common with each other and the countries around us that we should have no difficulty whatsoever in thinking of ourselves as Sri Lankans FIRST and whatever else afterwards. If we look back objectively we’ll find that our troubles began with ‘communal’ representation and the subsequent jockeying for the power to command and control. That’s where this ‘majoritarian’ business came in. The European theory of ‘Aryan superiority’ propounded by Arthur Joseph Comte de Gobineau and later by his disciple, Houston Stewart Chamberlain, gained ardent converts here who believed that because the Sinhalese spoke an Indo-Aryan language that they were racially ‘Aryans.’ But the whole ‘Indo-Aryan’ theory was about language and not about race—but the damage had been done and its bloodiest manifestation was the race terror during the Nazi Era.

The politicians of almost a hundred years ago (not quite) bought this specious theory and used it to further their agendas in both the North and the South. The insecure Northerners became the ‘victims’ and the Southerners raised the bogey of their domination through the bureaucracy. The tom-tom beating began in earnest with ‘race,’ ‘language,’ and ‘religion’ as the rallying cries and both sides were equally guilty of fanning the flames of hatred, distrust, and separatism. We must collectively kill this and bury it, especially so when the Mahinda Rajapakse Government is talking to the political leaders of the Tamil National Alliance in the hopes of reaching a modus operandi or ‘way of working together’ towards a full and final reconciliation even though the wounds may take a couple of generations to heal thoroughly. Let us all pray that this will happen.

Biologically, the inhabitants of this Island have more genes in common with each other and nothing to prove that any segment of the population is either superior or inferior to another. Therefore, if there are so many factors that conduce towards an overarching unity why should we keep on quibbling about ‘ethnic’ rights instead of arguing about fundamental human rights for all? Why do we want to perpetuate ethno-religious representation that divides rather than unites? These arguments are irrational and illogical. We must wake-up to ground realities after over three decades of bloody, murderous war in which over an estimated 100,000 died. Those deaths and the many thousands still living in our midst without limbs, eyesight and other grave disabilities should tell us in unequivocal terms that there can be no more bloodletting. If ‘ethnicity’ or ‘language’ or ‘religion’ were at the bottom of it we should take a long, hard look at ourselves and ask the question: "Was it worth it?" This question should be asked in Point Pedro and in Devinuvara, in Batticaloa as well as Colombo. This is the only piece of Planet Earth that we could all call "Home" and we must learn to live within that home peacefully without trampling each other’s ‘tails.’ One could well ask the question: "Why the hell can’t we or are we all a bunch of air-headed morons?" Seriously, the Tamil Union, the Sinhalese Sports Club, the BRC and the Malay Cricket Club should all be able to play friendly 50-over matches or even Test Matches in the real spirit of the game and we don’t need some woolly-headed ideologue telling us that it is an imperialist imposition. We must learn to play the game all over again in the spirit of brotherhood and camaraderie and repair the tears in the tapestry of Sri Lanka—otherwise, we’ll have to paraphrase the words of a melancholic song and sing: "Don’t Cry for Me—Sri Lanka."

Rabindranath Tagore wrote the national anthems of two countries, India and Bangladesh. But he deeply influenced the words and music of a third, the Lankan national anthem, 'Sri Lanka Matha'.
The anthem was written and composed by Ananda Samarakoon, most probably in 1939-40, while he was Tagore’s disciple at Visva-Bharathi University. Samarakoon’s first Shantiniketan stint ended after six months but it was inspiring enough for him to return and begin the first traditions of a unique Sinhalese music.

"There’s a close relation between the Indian and the Sri Lankan national anthems. It is original but styled on Rabindrasangeet (the poet’s body of songs); it could be called a sister song," KMA Bandara of the Tagore Society of Sri Lanka, formed in the late 1940s, said.

Tagore’s last of three visits to Sri Lanka was in 1934 when he came with his troupe and staged the dance drama `Sapmochon’ in Colombo’. In the audience was SWRD Bandaranaike – later to be prime minister – who wrote a critique of the performance for the Ceylon Daily News.

Tagore’s play was "indeed memorable" Bandaranaike wrote, adding "If any movement is started to send some pupils to study music and dancing at Shantiniketan, I for one will be ready to contribute my mite."

During the visit, besides giving lectures, Tagore laid the foundation stone of the Sripalee College in a place called Horana. "It was modeled on the university in Shantiniketan and focused on the fine arts. It has now changed into a normal college. But the University of Aesthetic Studies was inspired out of it," Bandara said.

Under "Gurudev’s" influence, society secretary, Dr Leel Gunasekera said, many leading artists of the day – drama artist Sarathchandra, music maestros Samarakoon and Amaradeva and the great dancer Chitrasena just to name a few -- dropped their Portuguese-influenced names and adopted Sinhalese ones. Many went to Shantiniketan to fine-tune their artistic talents.

The Society got together last week to modestly observe Tagore’s birth anniversary with Rabindrasangeet, skits and a lecture on the "cultural message Tagore gave us". Clearly, it went beyond dropping names.